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who does dependent care flex?
Vent/questions ahead. I'm fired up. Sorry in advance.
I have health flex and dependent flex through my employer and it's been a MAJOR headache. I get paid on the last day of the month. I usually get my flex reimbursement about a week before my paycheck so our budget is odd. Our month for budgeting runs from the 4th week of the month (when I get my flex payment) through the 3rd week of the next month. When I don't get my flex money on time it's a huge PITA because I pay pretty much all of my bills on automatic pay. I have to call every 3 to 4 months because on my payflex site it shows my payment (to me) as "unremitted" which means I'm not getting paid. I used to call Payflex first but realized that if it's on their site then everything is good with them. I have to call my employer and get it worked out. Soooooo annoying. Well - we're due and of course today I'm supposed to be paid and it reads "unremitted." I called my employer and was told that I'm breaking some sort of IRS rule by getting my payflex when I do. Umm.... I didn't set it up this way. This is just what happened and HAS HAPPENED FOR THREE YEARS!! The thing is, she told me there's no way I've been reimbursed at that time. I took screen shots of my account info and emailed them to her saying, "LOOK!! This is what has always gone down." Now I feel like she's just dicking with me since I questioned her. The thing is, I have some payments that will be taken out this week and I'd really like to have that money.
Does anyone know anything about this stuff? There's only ONE person who handles benefits even though there are thousands of employees. I don't know who else i could talk to because I don't think this woman knows what she's talking about. It's super highly frustrating to me. If I'm not going to get that money then I need to see if I can arrange other things for those bills that I pay at the end of the month. I'd rather not pay them late. I never pay bills late and now this lady is acting like I have to. This is on top of all the crap that went down after Amelie was born and all of that.
so so so so sooooooo mad!!!!! I show up early, stay late, work my butt off and do everything (and more) that I'm asked to do. THEN I have to fight to get paid what I've already earned. It's beyond frustrating because I love my job otherwise. This sort of thing makes me crunch numbers and really explore if staying at home is an option. I hate fighting about money.
Re: who does dependent care flex?
Married the love of my life 6/3/06
Became a family of three 8/25/09
In my workplace you can take your health flex at anytime during the year but your dependent flex you can not claim until that money has actually been deducted from your paycheck. Does that make sense? For example say you have $25.00 taken out of each paycheck (bi-weekly) for medical flex- If you had medical bills at the beginning of the year you could cash our your $650.00 right away...before you paid it in. But the dependent flex you can't take out until it has been paid in.
Not sure if that is legally how it is supposed to be or just how my workplace does it- We go through a third party for our flex benefits.
Pretty much. So are they just not paying now or what? The pay period ended nearly a month ago so it's not like I'm going to bunk out and not work until the end of the pay period. I already worked all of that month and a large portion of this month as well. (strange pay periods if you ask me, but what do I know?)
We did medical flex when Kelly was the only one with a "real" job. We never had a problem with them. I think I'm going to go through them for dependent care again because I just can't handle fighting with them. Fighting about money is something I said I'd never do. Yes, that was in context with my husband, but still, it's ridiculous and makes me feel really awful.
I've had issues with PayFlex themselves because for a few years they would take the Excel document my husband made as the bill. My aunt doesn't send us a bill, so we just made it up. Then, one month, they didn't reimburse us because there was no signature from my aunt. When I talked to them, they told me I was never reimbursed without a signature. Um, yes I was, for 3 years. Now, DH just types in her name and they accept it.
We are always short in being reimbursed until the second half of the year. We pay $400-500 per month in daycare, but they only take out $333 for PayFlex because of the summer months when we don't have bills. When summer hits, we get paid more than what we are paying for daycare because they are playing catch up from the previous months.
It sounds to me like your employer is being screwy with it all. Are you the only one having this problem? If there was an IRS issue, it would be bigger than just you, right? Sorry you are dealing with this, it sucks when money you are counting on doesn't come in!
I submit everything online. It is a pain.
Here is what I found works best for us.
1. We do the 5k
2. I submit these forms (via fax) at the end of the month. They make me wait to submit until after the care is completed even though I pay on the 1st for the whole month.
3. Money is taken out of dh's check. The money taken out is somewhere around $400 every month, which is less than the daycare bill.
4. After I submit it, it goes directly into our bank account IF there are funds they have from dh's paycheck. If I have more receipts than money they have from us (which happens every month because the daycare bill is more than the 5000/12 amount), it goes into an IOU smiles box until smiles' dh puts more money in from his paycheck. I get that money a couple of days after dh's paycheck but sometimes it takes longer.
It took me awhile to work out a system to figure out what makes life easier for me. I was submitting the receipts weekly = headache.
If I was you, I would have a slush savings account tied to my bank account. This slush savings account is the non emergency fund. If I was tight with the daycare bill, move money over then when you get reimbursed from flex people, move it back into slush savings account. Slush savings account doesn't have to be that big but it is a nice cushion to have in case things happen.
I'm not sure if your employer is like this or not... but some companies like to hold on to the money as long as possible. More money in account = interest income for them.
Is the issue here that you are trying to get paid before the period is up?
For instance, daycare makes us pay before services are given.... However, I can't turn in the receipts until after they care is given. It sucks because you have a double hit temporarily because they take your money from your paycheck, then you have to pay your daycare bill, and then after the week or month is up you can submit.
The care I'm trying to be reimbursed for is September 5th through September 30th.
probably - but this isn't a receipts issue. It's just a "give me my gawddamn money!" issue. :-)
I don't see the NEED for receipts since it's my money to begin with, but I'm sure some a-hole would find a way to screw someone over and ruin it for the rest of us.